Darker than Night by John Lutz

John Lutz talent reminds you of the vintage day mysteries
and yet is all modern. An interesting cat and mouse game. A serial killer is
always a great mystery subject, a great plotted ordeal.

John Lutz can grab the reader with his writing. Your
introduced to some of your characters in wonderful down to earth details such
as Detective Fedderman described as, married, having trouble getting it up, bad
breath, upset stomach, balding and 30 pounds overweight. His partner detective
Pearl Kasner described as a good looker, great rack, nice ass, could be an
actress or model if was taller.

Most of all is your main star, the main character Frank
Quinn described as an inch over 6 feet tall, twice broken nose, square jaw,
short chopped dark hair, lanky, green flat eyes, cop eyes. What is amazing
about this story is it’s not written out like your basic cop fiction. Your main
hero Quinn is in, forced retirement because he was about to reveal dirty cops
and so before he could report them they framed him as being a child rapist,
placing child porn on his computer and making a child come forward. They told
him to retire, so he had to costing him his reputation and career and his
marriage.

Now with the help of a Captain Harley Renz who wants to be
the new Chief of police offers Quinn a deal, he gives him a case to solve that
everyone else thinks are a murder suicide, Renz does not believe that and so he
wants Quinn to solve it for he can take the credit and when Renz is the new
Chief he will clear Quinns name and reinstate him.

Hearing a noise in the next room saying to yourself it's the
house settling or old pipes all the while thinking just maybe a masked killer
is there. This is one of those novels that sticks out with that reality, that
hidden fear or something you can't control, the boogieman in the dark waiting,
slowly, silently, waiting to strike out in all his crazy glory.

This is a great descriptive story but that is also its
downfall or at least the negative to this review. Too much side story between
the three detectives. The book flashes with too many characters and side
actions to those characters. I fill this book has too much filler or nonsense
moments just to make the book longer.

Even though this book is about a serial killer at times it
seems the killings are secondary or at least not the focus point at times with
the rattling page after page of Quinn and Pearl and so on. It mixes great
moments but nothing to stand out. The killings are mentioned like a side item
so you sense or imagine the killings told in text book format or better put not
described graphic enough to give the reader a sense of how horrible this killer
is.

Most mentions are like a secondary glance of "oh he
stabbed them" or "he shot them." I think the highlight of the
story was the back-story of Luther. I enjoyed the ultimate climax, the nice
twist ending yet I felt the book was way too long and just filled with
unimportant stuff.

Great author, great moments, an interesting read. Some will
like some will not, I am 50/50 with this book. I like some of it and I loathe
some of it.